Could the Red Sox have beaten those Damn Yankees without some intense scrutiny of the Yanks’ own strategies? We think not. The lesson that we have taken away from this series: Know your enemy.

The International Roundtable last weekend provided a valuable opportunity for the Macalester community to hear perspectives that are often silenced in favor of the leftist rhetoric that dominates our intellectual discourse. It is not news to anyone that the political spectrum running across Macalester’s campus does little to reflect the national polity. The remaining Yankee fans are likely to outnumber campus Republicans, and in the weeks before what many consider to be the most important presidential election in recent history, our endorsement of the Democratic candidate seems a moot point. As Macalester students, we may study the world and preach lofty goals of civic engagement, and perhaps even achieve them. But here in the Macalester Bubble, the right -wing ideology that guides American politics is often an afterthought.

This makes sense. Political activity on campus tends to be local and grassroots based. While we here at the Weekly generally don’t win the race to the left, it is unsurprising and somewhat comforting that a liberal arts community such as ours should have such tendencies. Yet last weekend’s Roundtable was an arresting reality check. There exists a world beyond our intellectual walls—and it happens to be a very significant one.

For all our talk of changing the world after graduation, we see very little of it during our time here. Engaging with more conservative viewpoints like those of Niall Ferguson and Michael Ledeen should not be viewed as an abandonment of our ideals, nor as a waste of time and resources. Rather, we should appreciate these guests as an opportunity to develop our arguments and gain perspective on how alternative views are heard and utilized in the real world. It fell to Ferguson to point out the inconsistencies between our reactions to Tariq Ali, whose intellectual leanings gave him the home court advantage, and Michael Ledeen, whose conservative ideology was much anticipated by his liberal audience. When Ali called for popular revolution in pro-American Latin American states, he was given a standing ovation. When Ledeen proposed similar revolution in anti-American regimes, specifically in Iran, he was lambasted. There are clearly legitimate reasons for the way that students responded to Ledeen’s address. At times he was downright offensive, and we surely do not wish to condone his treatment of Muslims or prognosis that “France is our enemy.”

We should all be careful in the way that we encounter unsympathetic views, and not be vulnerable to ideological labels. We should not embrace someone simply because they identify themselves as a leftist, nor should we jump on the offensive when we suppose that someone comes from a different side of the spectrum. Whether or not we like right-leaning views, it is important that we not dismiss them as simply wrong and thus unworthy of our consideration. Neoconservative policies are not rooted in the doctrine of promoting evil any more than they are in that of spreading freedom. Last weekend taught us to make sure that our arguments are fueled by honest intellectual reason instead of knee-jerk compulsiveness. Whatever our inevitable preconceptions, we should make sure that we recognize alternative views as serious ones that deserve our full attention and, of course, our full critical analysis—particularly when those alternative views happen to determine American policy.